Antisocial behaviour

The personal histories of ‘troubled’ families are presented as ‘chaotic’ in a report by an official adviser. The government has pledged to turn around the lives of 120,000 such families in England by 2015.

Louise Casey, head of the Troubled Families unit, interviewed 16 families (identified via family intervention projects in six local authorities in England) with the aim of getting a ‘true and recent understanding’ of the problems the families face, their histories and the scale of the challenge involved in meeting the government’s pledge.

David Cameron pledged a network of troubleshooters, along with more targeted support for 120,000 of Britain’s most troubled families, by 2015. Cameron promised families one dedicated worker rather than a ‘string of well-meaning, disconnected officials’.

Under the government’s proposals, families need to meet five out of seven criteria – including truanting children, parents with addiction and antisocial behaviour – to be classified as ‘troubled’.

The government is diverting £448m from existing departmental budgets over four years to help pay for a network of people who will identify families in need of help, make sure they get access to the right services and ensure that action is taken.

Unemployed people would have to prove they are actively volunteering in the community in order to qualify for certain welfare benefits and social housing, Westminster Council proposes in a consultation document, A Civic Contract for Westminster. In measures aimed at ending what it calls the ‘something for nothing culture’, the Council also proposes that working families who ‘play by the rules’ should get priority for social housing while existing tenants who fall foul of the law should be evicted. The Council’s aim is to deploy shrinking welfare resources guided by the principles of ‘responsibility, fairness and opportunity’ and claims its proposals are a potential model for the future of local public services across Britain. It says: ‘A culture of “something for nothing” is no longer financially possible and is not the kind of society we wish to foster.’

PSE:UK is a major collaboration between the University of Bristol, Heriot-Watt University, The Open University, Queen's University Belfast, University of Glasgow and the University of York working with the National Centre for Social Research and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency. ESRC Grant RES-060-25-0052.